Derrick Brown a/k/a Derrick Latory Brown a/k/a Dedrick Brown v. State of Mississippi

Summary

The Supreme Court of Mississippi reversed the Court of Appeals and reinstated Brown’s conviction and sentence for the sale of cocaine. The court held that recorded conversations between a confidential informant and unidentified persons were not hearsay because they were admitted to show that the conversations occurred and their general substance, and it rejected Brown’s confrontation-clause claim.

Holdings

1. The recorded conversations were not hearsay because the State offered them to show that the conversations occurred and their general subject matter, not to prove the truth of the statements or to establish that Brown participated in the conversations.
2. Admission of the recordings did not violate Brown's federal or state constitutional rights to confront witnesses because the unidentified speakers were not presented as witnesses against him, the State did not claim that one of the voices was Brown's, and Brown was permitted to cross-examine every State witness who testified.
3. The entrapment-instruction issue was without merit.

Questions Presented

1. Whether the recorded pre-drug-buy telephone conversations between the confidential informant and unidentified persons were inadmissible hearsay.
2. Whether admission of the recorded conversations violated Brown's rights under the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article 3, Section 26 of the Mississippi Constitution.
3. Whether the trial court erred in refusing Brown's requested entrapment jury instruction.

Disposition

reversed